From left, Gladstone City Manager Rob Spreitzer and Mayor Joe Thompson present a giant check to Gladstone High School senior Tyler Soderman. The scholarship donation was made possible by WPPI, represented by Brett Niemi at right.

GLADSTONE — Each year, member-owned WPPI Energy, which supplies electric power to the City of Gladstone, awards a scholarship to a local teen.

This year’s winner was 12th-grader Tyler Soderman from Gladstone Area High School, who wrote a stand-out essay.

“Each year, WPPI provides funds to the city to use for donations and other good things for the community. And one of the things that the city chose to do with some of that money is to fund what’s called a Public Power scholarship,” explained Brett Niemi, Senior Energy Services Manager with WPPI.

“How we run it is — we bring advertising to the schools, and for students to apply, they have to write a short essay on what the value of having a publicly owned utility is. This year we chose Tyler Soderman as the recipient of this year’s scholarship. He did a great job putting the essay together, and we’re really happy to be able to present him with a check for $4,000 tonight,” said Niemi, congratulating the student before posing for a photograph of the check presentation to Soderman alongside Gladstone City Manager Rob Spreitzer and Mayor Joe Thompson.

Last year, two students — Max Wilson and Victoria Mantela — earned the Public Power Scholarship, which was split between them.